


Making Your Way

by stars_inthe_sky



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Bar/Pub, Amputation, Boston, F/M, Floor Sex, Gen, Veterans, cheers - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-11
Updated: 2014-05-11
Packaged: 2018-01-24 08:45:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1598738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stars_inthe_sky/pseuds/stars_inthe_sky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where they all work at a bar in downtown Boston, and Bucky’s a twitchy, one-armed, hobo-looking vet who may or may not have the crazy eyes.</p><p>Or: No one’s troubles are all that different, and the bar that Steve manages is as good a place for a new start as any. (Not quite a Cheers AU.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [red_b_rackham](https://archiveofourown.org/users/red_b_rackham/gifts), [throwingpens](https://archiveofourown.org/users/throwingpens/gifts).



> For [Red](http://archiveofourown.org/users/red_b_rackham), who requested an Avengers/Cheers AU for her birthday, and [Amber](http://archiveofourown.org/users/throwingpens), who helped me brainstorm this sucker into existence from scratch.
> 
> With special thanks to [Lex](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ilostmyshoe) for her typically awesome beta-reading and [Leslie](http://archiveofourown.org/users/scullyseviltwin) for fact-checking the Boston.
> 
> Now with [amazing artwork](http://redrackham87.tumblr.com/image/105642215717) by the birthday girl herself!

“You should come work at the Tower & Shield,” Steve says over a bowl of Cheerios, in that tone that’s supposed to sound nonchalant but that Bucky knows means he’s been trying to figure out how to say it for about a week.

“Are you kidding me?”

“No—I mean, there’s an opening, and they like to hire by word of mouth—”

“Steve. What the hell kind of job is there for a twitchy, one-armed hobo with the crazy eyes at a _bar_?”

“You don’t have the crazy eyes. And you’re not a hobo. I told you, there’s plenty of room here for you.” After a pause, he adds, “Though you’d probably look less homeless if you actually shaved and got a haircut.”

Bucky reaches protectively for his ponytail. “The ladies like it.”

“What ladies?”

“Well, not the ladies _you_ like. Speaking of which—have you called that waitress from the Cask 'n Flagon yet?”

“Stop trying to change the subject. There’s an opening for a bouncer now that Phil’s gone, and as long as you can figure out how to hold the black light and a fake ID at the same time, you’d be good at it. Maybe with a lanyard…?”

“Door guy means dealing with people.”

“Yeah, but you don’t have to be nice to them. And on good nights, you’d get a share of the tips. And Tony’s okay to work for, once you get used to him.”

“Steve…”

“Buck, you need _something_ to do besides therapy every day. I get that your payout from the Army is okay, and I swear this isn’t about rent, but you can’t just bum around the apartment all the time and let your hair grow out. It’s not healthy, and it’s just…it’s not you. It’s been months, and I can’t just let you keep going like this. You should be back out in the world, doing—something. Anything. Please.”

Bucky hasn’t been able to say no to Steve since he’d perfected his puppy-eyed look at the age of eight, and twenty-odd years later the damn thing still works.

***

“Okay, this is how it goes: you show up on time. You stay at the door. You don’t let in anyone, _anyone_ with a fake ID. I don’t care how hot she is; Pepper will kill both of us and then bring me back from the dead to do it again. Not worth it. You get a fifteen-minute smoke break every two hours—”

“I don’t smoke.”

“Are you fucking kidding me? Three tours in Afghanistan and you don’t smoke?” Steve’s boss, Tony, is exactly as uncensored as advertised. Bucky kind of likes him.

“It was Iraq. And I did while I was over there, but after two months in a VA hospital for the whole limb amputation thing…not anymore.” Bucky hasn’t been on many job interviews, but this has to be one of the stranger ones.

“Fine. Whatever. It’s a break; you’ll take it,” Tony rolls his eyes and scribbles on what appears to be an inventory order form without actually looking at the paper. “Clint’ll walk you through the gig before we open—he’s been covering since Phil left—but you do not bother him when he’s behind the bar unless it’s an absolute emergency. Actually, you don’t bother anybody, period, because you’re staying at the door.”

“Got it.”

“You get a month’s probation at minimum wage—don’t look so surprised; there’s a reason people like working here in spite of me—and if it works out, we’ll bump you up to getting benefits or whatever. Don’t hit on the customers, don’t fucking drink on the job, and if you steal so much as a shot glass from me, I will have you out on the curb faster than you can blink.” Tony pauses for breath, though his pen is still moving, and adds, “Now’s the part where you say, ‘Thank you for this opportunity, Mr. Stark.’”

Working here is either going to be awesome or terrible, Bucky figures. “Thanks. Uh, thank you. Really. Steve seems to like it here a lot, so…”

Tony gives him a funny look. “You know, I hate doing hiring searches anyway, but I’ve never had Steve Rogers sound so sure that I needed to hire someone I’d never met. That guy tells you someone’s a good pick, and, well…even I’m going to listen to him, you know? Although I don’t know how you can stand to room with that much sunshine.”

“You get used to it, I guess. He’s been that way since we were kids, so…”

“Anyway, as I was saying,” Tony continues. “Congrats, you have a job. Now get a damn razor—I don’t care what you look like as long as it seems intentional—and don’t make me regret hiring the sullen, one-armed hobo guy with no formal experience.” He rises from the barstool, pivots, and heads toward the back room in one swift motion.

“You forget the crazy eyes,’” Bucky calls after him.

Tony doesn’t even break his stride. “Believe me, I’m trying to.”

***

An hour later, after the paperwork is filled out, Steve arrives and ropes Bucky into helping him set up tables as the rest of the staff trickles in. Steve introduces people as they arrive, and Bucky finds it entertaining to finally have faces to put with the names he’s been hearing since he moved into Steve’s spare room.

Clint Barton, bartender and interim bouncer, turns out to be a square-jawed Southie native, Bucky’s height and maybe ten years older, with an easy grin and a thick Boston brogue that would make Ben Affleck jealous. Steve lets Bucky off of table duty to get the gist of being the “door guy,” which is a relief—Bucky’s remaining arm is in excellent shape, and he appreciates that Steve doesn’t treat him like an invalid, but pulling down chairs isn’t an action he’ll be executing with grace anytime soon.

“So, you ever done this kind of thing before?” Clint asks once they’ve run through how to recognize fake IDs and when to call the police.

Bucky shakes his head. “Three tours in Iraq, but I’m thinking this’ll be a lot more drunk college kids and not as many bombs.”

“Well…probably not, no,” Clint trails off.

Bucky follows his gaze to the “Boston Strong” poster hung by the door and flushes. “Sorry, I was just—I haven’t been back in town that long. Sorry.”

“Nah, it’s okay. Gets rough here, but nothing like what you had.”

“It’s, uh, not a competition,” Bucky says, fidgeting with the hem of his shirt. “So…the door? Tony said it was pretty much…don’t leave this spot, don’t let them in if they’re underage, and don’t bother anyone else who’s working.”

“That’s mostly it, yeah,” Clint nods. “Make sure you use the counter—can’t have too many people in here, you know, fire regulations, but Steve’ll let you know if it’s getting too full before that anyway. You hit his limit or the fire marshal’s, then it’s just a one-in-one-out gig. Anyone gives you lip, get in their face. Don’t hit ‘em, ‘cause that’s an easy ride to a lawsuit, but make ‘em think you will, and after nine or so make sure you got the police on speed-dial. Phil never had to call ‘em, but you never know.”

“That’s it?”

“What, you wanna role-play or some shit? Yeah, that’s it. Oh, and don’t fucking drink on the job. Tony’ll let you have whatever after we close, but you gotta be stone-cold sober on the job. Trust me, it’s not pretty otherwise.”

“That’s fine. Not a big drinker.”

“Seriously?” Clint’s eyes flicker to Bucky’s empty sleeve. “After—?”

Bucky shrugs. “I spent almost two months in the hospital after I lost it, and I’m still on way too many drugs for booze to be a good idea. It’s not that big a thing, but it’s easier to just not drink than it is to try to sneak around Steve.”

Clint snorts. “He’s a good guy, Steve. Talks a lot about you.”

“I’m lucky to have him. Wouldn’t have had anywhere else to go after I got discharged.”

“Everybody needs one of those friends.”

“Yeah.”

“You’ll meet Nat at some point—she’s mine.”

“Wicked,” Bucky says, with just enough of an accent to make Clint smile. “Mind helping me figure out how to deal with this flashlight and the IDs all at once?”

***

Bucky’s first night on the job is a Tuesday when the Red Sox aren’t playing, so the Tower & Shield is fairly quiet, and the most interesting thing that happens at the door is a random German guy whose passport appears to be out of date, until Bucky remembers the month and day are switched and feels like an idiot.

He hasn’t really spoken with most of the staff, but, after closing, Clint and Steve rally them for a quick welcome toast: Tony, Tony’s girlfriend-slash-business manager Pepper, Bruce the cook, and Steve’s team of servers—the industrious Rhodey, stern and silent Maria, and Steve’s friend Sam, whom Bucky vaguely remembers meeting once or twice before.

(He also vaguely remembers thinking that Sam’s temperament matched Steve’s much better than Bucky’s did these days, and that that was the kind of friend Steve should really have let live with him.)

It’s nice of them, anyway, even if Steve makes him toast with ginger ale and he doesn’t actually know any of his new coworkers yet. Around two, everyone finishes cleaning up and heads home. Steve nearly nods off mid-stride as they cross the bridge back to East Cambridge—poor guy has been burning the candle on both ends, between school and work—but Bucky, pockets heavy with change from his share of the tips and fingers sore from toying with ID cards, feels more awake than he can remember feeling in a while.

***

The following afternoon, Bucky’s helping Steve sort through new paper inventory when the back door creaks open and a redheaded woman steps through it with a sleepy, “Hey, Steve.”

Bucky ducks behind the bar faster than he would’ve thought possible, knocking an empty bottle off the counter in the process. Steve squats down next to him, without even offering Bucky the dignity of pretending that the bottle fell first.

“Any reason we’re hiding behind the bar, Buck?”

“You,” Bucky hisses, “You did _not_ tell me that Natalia worked here!”

Steve looks confused. “You mean Natasha who just came in? I know I’ve talked about her before…she’s the one doing a Ph.D. at BU—”

“No, I mean Natalia— _sukin syn_ , she must be going by her name in English. Well, fuck me.”

“Wait—the cultural trainer you had the thing with before you deployed back in…what? 2007?”

“Yes—wait, how do you even remember that?”

“And you didn’t keep in touch with her even though I kept telling you how happy you sounded on the phone?”

“It was only, like, a month or two, it wasn’t like…anyway, we ended things in a perfectly fine place…”

“Then why are we hiding behind the bar?”

“Beats me,” Natasha herself says from above them. “Nice to see you again, James.”

He winces but there’s not much else to do besides stand up, smile awkwardly, and say, “You, too. Sorry—I don’t do surprises so well these days.”

She glances at his pinned-up left sleeve so briefly he thinks he might have imagined it, and then turns to Steve. “Why didn’t you tell me your crazy veteran friend was James Barnes? Or give him fair warning, apparently.”

Steve is looking between the two of them like he’s not sure if he knows either. “As far as I can tell…he goes by Bucky but you knew him as James, and you go by Natasha but he knew you as Natalia. Don’t blame me for not keeping track of everyone’s aliases.” He throws up his hands in defeat and determinedly stalks toward the storeroom where the rest of the shipment is.

Bucky stares at the woman who’s been quietly haunting his dreams for the better part of a decade, and it’s gratifying that at least she’s staring right back at him.

She recovers first, though, and asks, “So, you’re the new bouncer? How’s that working out?”

“All one night of it? Fine, so far. Just nice to get out of the house for something other than physical therapy. Or occupational therapy. Or regular therapy, which just feels like an insult some days.”

“After two tours in Iraq?”

“Three—there was another one after you, uh, saw me off. And I don’t have PTSD or anything; it’s just a thing they make you do, especially after...” He shrugs his left shoulder in demonstration rather than finishing the sentence.

“That’s what Steve said—you’re fine with crowds and whatever, just…I believe “twitchy” was the word he used?”

“Yeah. And, uh… you’re in grad school, I guess? That’s great; I remember you wanted to do that.” He shoves his hand into the pocket of his jeans, hoping he looks more casual than awkward.

“Yeah, it’s all right. Stipend barely covers rent, though, thus the waitressing.”

“Steve said you were the reason all the servers like to split tips at the end of the night.”

She chuckles, and her smile takes him back several years. “Steve says nice things about everybody.” He thinks there might be a flirtatious edge to her tone.

“Well, if we’re having a good night, I get in on that pool now, so I hope it’s true.” Bucky smiles. It’s lucky he finally shaved.

“Only if you’re very good,” she replies as she turns to help with the table set-up, and this time there’s definitely a certain lilt in her voice. “See you around.”

He kneels back down to pick up the pieces of the bottle, but after about fifteen seconds hears Clint gawk, “Oh my god, Steve’s crazy hobo friend is your winter-2007 soldier?”

“He looked less homeless then,” Natasha says at the same time that Steve interrupts Clint with, “He’s not crazy—it’s just a ponytail!”

Bucky decides he’s definitely keeping the hair, and he doesn’t know what on Earth he’s supposed to do now that the woman he’d known as Natalia Romanova is apparently a semi-permanent fixture in his life again.

***

Once the Tower & Shield opens for the night, he doesn’t have a chance to wonder about Natasha. It’s a game day, and the crush of Red Sox fans doesn’t relent until the fourth inning. By the time Rhodey pops out to remind him that he’s overdue for a break, Bucky’s hand is starting to cramp from thumbing IDs. Around the back of the building, Bruce is also on break. It’s possible his cigarette is actually weed, but Bucky’s not about to say anything.

They sit silently on a wooden bench by the back door for a minute or so, before Bruce says, without turning his head, “It’s medicinal.”

“Okay.”

“Keeps me sane. Tony knows, so.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything.”

“Oh, okay.” Bruce exhales a small cloud of smoke.

According to Steve, Bruce makes great food, but he’s strictly not allowed near customers. The guy seems pretty chill; in Bucky’s experience, volatile people who like to start bar fights tend not to wear glasses. Still, that could just be the pot.

Bucky’s grateful for the quiet after the crowd at the door, but he can’t just sit here breathing Bruce’s exhalations for the next thirteen minutes. “So, how’d you end up working here?” When Bruce doesn’t respond, he tries again, “What’s it medicinal for?”

Bruce sighs mightily. “Anger management. I’m…I’ve got a temper. Like, hairline trigger kind of thing. Got booted from MIT a few years ago, and Tony was the only person who’d take a chance on me.”

“What were you doing at MIT?”

“Post-doc. Studying radiation, mainly. Not exactly relevant to this place, but I’d done enough cooking in life to know how to flip burgers,” he shrugs. “It’s a good gig, honestly. Haven’t had an outburst in a while now, and the pay’s decent. Keeps life interesting.”

“Do you miss it?”

“MIT?”

“Doing what you always thought you’d be doing,” Bucky catches himself as soon as the words leave his mouth, but Bruce just shrugs.

“Eh, I miss getting to pursue new knowledge. I don’t miss the egos—Tony’s aside—or academia, or undergrads, or tiny readings on poorly calibrated gauges that the RA didn’t clean the night before...” The hand holding his joint starts to shake, and Bruce falls silent again, inhaling and exhaling in a presumably calming rhythm. “And I like it here, even if it wasn’t where I planned to end up originally. Good people, you know?” Bucky, unsure of how to respond, just shrugs.

After a few minutes, Bruce asks, “So, how’s Day 2? Besides Natasha.”

“How do you—?“

“It’s not that big a place. Everyone knows everything; that’s just how it works. Also, Clint’s got a mouth.”

“It’s fine,” Bucky says, ignoring the other part of the question. “No trouble yet, but it sounds like it’ll start getting messier after the game, when it’s later and the only people here are getting wasted.”

“Sounds about right.  You okay with the, uh, arm thing?”

Bucky grins wryly. “What arm thing?”

“Fair enough,” Bruce chuckles. “Can I ask what happened? I know Steve said you’re a veteran.”

“Yeah…there’s not much to tell, though. I was guarding a supply convoy on the way back to Al Taji, we drove over one of those makeshift roadside bombs, and I woke up in a hospital a few days later with a stump coming out of my shoulder. That was…um, a little over a year ago.”

“But, I mean, you’re military. You got a Purple Heart or something, right?”

“Two, actually. The leg-shrapnel isn’t as noticeable.”

“So wouldn’t they hook you up with a decent prosthetic?”

Bucky shrugs again, jerking his empty sleeve. “The default one is pretty basic, and not that comfortable—too many straps and buckles—and it’s not much more useful than a hook. A lot of guys like me just go without. I’m on a couple of waiting lists for something fancier, but…”

“They’re expensive, and a lot of people want one?”

“Yeah.”

“Shit, man, that sucks.”

“Yeah,” Bucky studies the other guy for a moment.

“You know, you seem kind of nonchalant about the whole one-armed thing. I mean, considering.”

“Well, it’s not like it’s going to grow back.”

Bruce laughs, an honest and unguarded chuckle that seems like it’s a rare expression for him. Bucky wonders exactly how bad the cook’s temper tantrums had been to leave that kind of mark, and then he catches himself trying to remember the last time he’d smiled in front of anyone besides Steve before yesterday.

He’d told Clint yesterday that trauma wasn’t a competition, but now he wonders if maybe it’s more like a team sport.

***

Bucky is unfortunately right about the latter part of the night—there’s a steady trickle of customers that isn’t so much overwhelming as increasingly drunk, and he’d forgotten about the particular brand of rich Masshole banker type that liked to slum it at a place like the Tower.

No one really talks to him beyond the occasional, “here” and “thank you,” but the ones who are clearly already a few drinks in stare openly at him, and a couple of the women in particular give him the sort of pitying look that he can’t stand. He’s mostly adjusted to functioning as he is, but sad looks from strangers make him want to claw through concrete.

It’s finally quiet about an hour before closing. Bucky’s exploring a new iPhone game when Natasha appears, dragging a middle-aged customer by his shirt collar. As soon as she’s clear of the door and Bucky’s stool, she gives the guy a hard shove, and he stumbles toward the curb but manages not to teeter over.

“Too drunk to stay?”

“Among other things,” she grimaces. “I have to go run his poor wife’s credit card. Try to make sure he doesn’t wander into oncoming traffic, but don’t try too hard.”

Bucky mock-salutes and then looks at Natasha more closely. “What did he do? Besides wobble?”

She sighs and runs a hand through her hair, which is as bright and borderline-unnaturally red as he remembers. “Not the first time I’ve had my ass slapped by an idiot downstairs, but having the wife sitting right there was new.”

Bucky feels his face cycle through about six different expressions at once, but all that comes out of his mouth is, “Are you sure he shouldn’t just be waiting _in_ the street there? I could strategically flag down a bus or something.”

“Nah, his wife can deal with it. Although I may offer a couple of pointers, as long as she tips like she should after _that_ display.”

The drunk is swaying back toward them, looking almost cartoonish. Bucky stands up to block the door—and Natasha—but the man just stops a few feet away and slurs, “Hold onto that ass, man. It’s a good one.”

“Right. That’s it,” Natasha says, and leaves, pulling the door shut behind her with a slam.

“You guys make such a good couple,” the man adds. “Your kids’ll have really big eyes. And matching angry faces!”

Bucky groans, half-hoping he’ll just throw a punch so that hitting him back will be justified.

***

The night ends with another round of drinks. Bucky chugs a glass of water and is surprised when Natasha places two glasses of soda on the bar in front of him and then drinks from one.

“Thanks. You’re not…” He gestures vaguely at Tony, who’s pushing shots of what might be tequila on Maria (who crosses her arms and glares), Rhodey (who accepts), and Clint (who accepts two).

“I’m not. It’s the constitution, don’t you remember?” she says in Russian.

He grins and switches languages, too. “How could I forget? But do you _ever_ drink, with that attitude?”

“It’s never worth the effort to get properly drunk. You?”

“I only bleed for the Motherland on my mother’s side, and it’s always worth the effort to overcome that. The last year or two exempted, of course.”

“Right. Steve made it _very_ clear that you were not to be served alcohol until you’re clean.”

“I’m not a drug addict!” he says. “I have a handful of shrapnel in my thigh and I lost an _arm_ and I’m in three kinds of therapy. I’m allowed a couple of mood elevators.”

She leans away from him, taken slightly aback. “That’s not what I meant. It was just a joke.” After a moment, she adds, still in Russian, “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well,” he mutters in English.

“Hey!” Clint skids to a stop behind their stools and stares at Bucky. “You speak Russian?”

Bucky remembers belatedly that Clint had mentioned Natasha the night before, and he likes Clint thus far, so he replies as evenly as he can, “Yeah, my mom was from Novgorod. She taught me growing up—liked having someone to talk to.”

“That how you met Nat?”

“It was when I was still doing the cultural trainings in D.C.,” Natasha explains. “I had more of an accent then, so he started asking me questions in Russian. The rest of the class hated him, I think.”

“They were fine with it, once I got your number,” Bucky pointed out.

“Oh, I gave that to you?” she asks, too innocently. “You never did call it after that winter.”

“Seven-hour time difference between Washington and Baghdad, and you could’ve gotten the APO address for Camp Taji pretty easily.”

“Fair enough,” Natasha says, taking a long pull from her straw. Her eyes stay on Bucky.

“Am I interrupting something?” Clint asks.

Bucky honestly isn’t sure, but Natasha laughs beautifully and shakes her head.


	2. Chapter 2

“So…you prefer Bucky, right? How do you think you’re settling in here?” Pepper Potts is tall, model-skinny, and too put-together for the kind of dive her boyfriend owns, but she’s impossible to dislike. She’s also apparently the one who actually runs the whole show, which isn’t hard to believe, having met Tony. “It’s been about a month, so I’d like to take you off of probation and discuss your future here.”

Bucky is suddenly acutely aware of his scuffed jeans and threadbare flannel, and he finger-combs his hair back out of his face. “Yeah. I mean, it’s been good, I think. Get along with everyone, haven’t had too much trouble at the door, pay’s nice.”

“And outside of work? Everything fairly stable?”

“Uh, yeah. I’ve got a good routine down these days. Therapy in the morning, the bar at night. Even started going to some of the other events and things at the VA—Steve can tell you.”

“You two live together, right?”

His fist tenses under the table. “Not that it’s any of your business, but…yeah. I can even pay my half of the rent now.”

Either Pepper doesn’t notice his tone, or she simply doesn’t care. “That’s great. I’m sure anyone putting himself through a graphic design master’s needs every dollar he can get. I know what he makes here, and being the floor manager isn’t _that_ lucrative.” She offers him a warm smile that he doesn’t deserve in the slightest.

“Yeah…well, he’d never say as much, though. I mean, you know him.”

“I do. We’re lucky to have him here. But I’d like to talk about you.”

“What about me?”

“Well, what are your future plans? Where do you see yourself in the next few years?”

Bucky really just wants to sign whatever he needs to sign to get paid slightly more. “Lady, a year and a half ago I had two arms and was running around the suburbs of Baghdad every day. I _really_ didn’t see this chapter coming. I have no fucking clue what I’d even be doing now if Steve hadn’t gotten me this job. I definitely don’t have some kind of five-year plan. If you’re trying to get rid of me, just say so.”

“Oh, hardly,” Pepper says. He’s never met anyone with a poker face like this. “You’re actually quite good at your job. I just imagine there are other things you’d like to be doing at some point. Steve and Natasha are in school, as I’m sure you know, and this is a second job for several of the others.”

“What about you?”

“Well, this is hardly the only business Tony owns that I manage. Although, between you and me, I think it’s his favorite.” She offers him a conspiratorial smile, and he finds himself half-smiling back in spite of himself. “Anyway, have you given any thought to what else you might want to do in life? Again, you’re a very good bouncer—we’ll keep you as long as you want to stay. We just don’t want to keep you from other opportunities, should they arise.”

Bucky can feel his shoulders slumping, almost of their own accord. “I’m a twitchy vet with one arm. Everyone thinks I look like a homeless person on a good day. And I’m not exactly cut out for office work. Or schooling. You can ask Steve—I barely made it out of high school. Don’t know where I would’ve landed without the Army. I mean—there used to be other things I liked, but now? I’m still counting it as a victory that I’ve got a job and a place to live, and that I can walk around the Common without panic attacks, which is more than a lot of guys can say. So if I get to keep this job, that’s—that’s as far as I’m thinking right now. Is that okay with you?”

“Absolutely,” Pepper smiles. There’s a stack of papers and notebooks by her elbow, but her attention is entirely focused on Bucky. She’s not even fidgeting. He makes a mental note to ask someone how on Earth she and Tony work as a couple. “I just wanted to make sure you were thinking about it. So, if you can just fill out these three forms, we’ll get you all set.”

“Great. Thanks. And, uh, sorry. I know I’m not exactly…”

“We all have our reasons for being here, Bucky. Yours are as valid as anyone else’s. Although you might consider a haircut if you’re concerned about the hobo thing.”

The following afternoon, he lets Steve trim off a few inches of his hair. It still falls past his ears but looks (in Tony’s words) intentional. People start calling him a dirty hipster instead of a hobo, and he thinks Natasha might have stared at him for an extra couple of seconds the next time she sees him.

***

“Since when are we on break at the same time?” Natasha asks when he finds her on the bench out back a couple of weeks later.

“Since this afternoon, when Steve made the schedule,” Bucky replies.

They haven’t been avoiding each other, per se, but she’s been mostly brusque—vaguely affable at best—and Bucky hasn’t exactly sought out one-on-one time with her to investigate that. It’s been a long time since they parted ways all those years ago, and he’s far from the charmer he’d been then.

Still, she’s as utterly alluring as he remembered, and when she speaks in Russian—just to Bucky, because no one else at the Tower & Shield understands the language—it’s a little like being welcomed home, in a strange way. Not that he would ever admit that, even to Steve.

“I think he was just rearranging to cover everything now that Maria left,“ he adds. “But it looked complicated. There was a spreadsheet.”

“Tony’s other restaurant should make good use out of her, at least. We can fake it on the floor until he hires someone new. And,” she adds, “I wasn’t complaining, I just usually overlap with Clint, is all.”

“Oh. Right.” Bucky sets down the plate of chicken wings that Bruce had slipped him on the way out and gestures to Natasha to help herself. “You guys seem good together.”

“There’s no ‘together,’” she says, with practiced exacerbation. “He’s, like, my Steve. If Steve couldn’t pronounce the letter ‘R’ reliably and was studying for the police academy exam in a possibly-misguided attempt to impress a girl named Bobbi-with-an-i.”

“Oh, yeah, I know—I mean, he said something like that before I met you. Or re-met you. Or knew ‘Nat’ meant you.”

“Oh. Sorry, people usually just assume…”

“How d’you know each other so well, anyway?”

“Craigslist roommates when I first moved up here a few years ago. It was the two of us and this third guy named Carson. Total creep—he kept stealing shit, and I’d have to keep my door locked if I didn’t want to be ogled—but his name was on the lease. We teamed up to get rid of him, which took about four months of subterfuge and subliminal messaging and a thing with a parakeet that was actually a total accident…but anyway, by the time he finally gave up and moved back to Kansas, we were bonded for life.”

“A parakeet?”

“It’s not as good a story as it sounds.” Natasha bites into a wing and makes a face as the sauce drips all over her hand.

“I’d like to be the judge of that.”

“Well, maybe I’ll tell you about it sometime. If you ask nicely. Maybe.”

“Or I could just ask Clint.”

“Oh, no, he’s sworn to secrecy.”

There’s more sauce trickling down her chin, but Bucky’s hand is covered in the stuff, too, and he can’t figure out a quick way to finish the wing he’s holding, clean off his hand, and gracefully offer to dab at her face before she wipes it off herself.

“So, is he how you landed here?” he asks eventually.

She nods. “He used to work with Phil at another bar, over in Allston, and Phil got them jobs here when it closed. I guess you never met Phil, but he was nice. Sort of boringly great, if that makes sense? Decent bouncer, but he didn’t really intimidate people so much as Jedi mind-trick them into behaving.”

They both reach for wings at the same time and bump hands. She jerks hers back first.

“So, if he’s got Bobbi-with-an-i, where does that leave you?” Bucky asks before he can second-guess the question.

Natasha retrieves another wing and nibbles at it for a few seconds before responding. “With zero free time, honestly. If I’m not here or sleeping, I’m working on my dissertation.”

“God, I can’t imagine going back to school voluntarily. Let alone doing what you’re doing—international relations, right?”

“What can I say? I like reading about the Cold War. Old home, new home…And you’d be surprised at the ways it ended up impacting how the U.S. deals with contemporary global conflicts—I mean, especially in Iraq…” she trails off, and it’s the first time he can think of that she’s stared at what remains of his left shoulder.

He lets himself feel uncomfortable and incomplete and a little annoyed for a moment, like they tell him he should, and then switches to Russian. “It sounds fascinating, Natalia. Maybe you can tell me more on the next break?”

She grins—not the patronizing, camera-ready smile that she puts on for customers, but the open, joyous expression that he’d spent most of his second tour wishing he’d gotten a picture of. “I’d like that,” she says, also in Russian. “You know, I went for the Anglicized name when I got my U.S. citizenship. No one calls me Natalia anymore.”

“No one calls me James, either.”

***

There’s a Red Sox–Yankees game on, and the line is nuts. Tony maintains he doesn’t want to hire a second door guy because the epic line outside makes the Tower & Shield look like a hotter spot than it is most of the time. Plus, he points out, no one’s going to bitch about how long it takes to get their IDs checked when the guy doing it is obviously handicapped.

Bucky’s isn’t sure he appreciates this appropriation of his lack of a left arm, but he figures if the bar is making money and Tony is happy, it’s more or less for the best. And he’s got the ID thing down to a science now. Plus, on quieter nights, he’s making a solid dent in the reading list that the servers and Bruce had put together and practically forced on him in lieu of the iPhone games he’d been playing during lulls.

And sure, he’s been reading a lot about American foreign policy lately, but that’s only because Bruce recommended a tome by Jonathan Franzen and Sam tried to hand him a stack of fantasy novels that were about a thousand pages each.

As the line starts to calm down, Bucky reopens a surprisingly interesting account of the Cold War’s effects on humanitarian intervention. There’s a twenty-minute dry spell, which is a relief, and he’s just starting to wish that Steve would pop out with a score update when his concentration is broken by a curt, “Excuse me.”

He looks up from his—well, Natasha’s—book at a kid who can’t be more than twenty-two and has to be one of those Harvard trust-fund creeps, because who else would be wearing a tie to this bar on a game night?

“ID, please.”

The kid rolls his eyes and hands over his driver’s license—Connecticut, go figure—and Bucky checks it under the black light before handing it back. He gestures to the pearl-necklace-wearing blonde behind him, and she offers him an ID that’s both expired and clearly not a picture of her.

Stupid college kids. It’s hardly the first fake ID he’s seen, though usually people manage to at least get the dates right. “Sorry, I can’t let you in with this.”

“Are you kidding me?” the guy says, in the kind of tone that makes Bucky want to pull the amputee-veteran card just to make him uncomfortable in his entitlement. “What’s your problem?”

Bucky really hates when people start living up to stereotypes. “Well, it’s expired. By two years.”

“But it says she’s twenty-one, see?”

“Well, it says someone is twenty-four, actually, but unless your friend had an assload of Botox, a nose job, and dyed her hair without getting a new photo taken, this isn’t her ID, and I can’t let her in. You’re welcome to go.” He slips the card under his book for safekeeping, which is both policy and a good way to endear someone to the police, but the kid doesn’t budge, even though a short line has started to form behind him.

“Give her her ID back.”

“That’d be illegal,” Bucky says. “Please, just go in or don’t, because you’re holding people up.”

“She’s coming in with me, then. Thanks a lot. I’m going to go find your manager.”

Bucky closes his book and stands up, fake ID in hand. He’s a few inches shorter than this brat but definitely wider, and the one-armed homeless-hipster look actually seems to intimidate him slightly. Still, the kid persists, “What, are you going to hit me? With…that? Please, how many drugs are you _on_ right now?”

“I’m down to just a couple now, actually. The shrinks were worried after I came back from Iraq that I was all fucked up, you know? And I got really into doing all these _one-armed_ pull-ups, and everyone worried I was just preparing for the day when I would just…snap.” He bends the card between his fingers, and the thing breaks in half with a satisfying _crack_ at just the right moment.

“Funny thing is,” he continues. “Who knows what’ll actually be the last straw on any given day? I’ve seen all kinds of shit, and you…well, let’s just say you’re not the first asshole to wonder how bad a guy with one arm can fuck you up. So, how badly do you want to go in?”

It’s all Bucky can do to keep from grinning when the brat makes a weak scoffing noise and stalks off, yanking the underage girl along with him. The handful of people who had lined up behind him actually start to clap, and a pair that looks suspiciously young ducks out of line. Bucky manages to keep a straight face as he admits the rest of them, and it’s only when the door is clear again and he reaches for his book, finally grinning to himself, that he notices Tony standing in the doorway.

Tony grins and claps his hands a couple of times. “Barnes, I’m giving you a raise just for telling that trust-fund Harvard douche where he could _paahk_ it without potential legal consequences.”

Bucky scratches the back of his neck, a nervous habit he picked up at some point when it was still weird to have anything longer than a crew cut there. “Thanks, but…aren’t you, like, a trust-fund Harvard guy, too?”

“Please, I went to MIT. Totally different breed of douche. And my trust fund is why you have a job, so stop with the smirking. Honestly, shouldn’t you be able to tell your university nimrods apart? Aren’t you _from_ here?”

“Well, I’m from Worcester, so not really. I only ended up in the city because Steve was here for school.”

“Right, whatever. Just make sure I tell Pepper before the next pay period starts, or I’m going to forget.”

Bucky mock-salutes. “Yessir.”

***

Maria’s replacement is an equally solemn brunette called Betty with whom Bruce can’t seem to make eye contact, but Bucky and Natasha keep ending up with the same breaks most nights anyway. She doesn’t seem to mind the change, though, and he certainly prefers her company to Bruce’s—especially as their now-different break times mean that Bruce can continue to hand off leftover food.

On this particular summer evening, they’re sharing a plate of nachos that some Emerson girls had deemed “too cheesy,” which, in fairness, do seem to be more liberally doused with cheese than usual. Bucky grabs a handful of chips and is rewarded by a giant dollop of molten cheddar that slides out of his hand. He barely aims it back over the platter in time and can’t suppress the blush that spreads across his cheeks and neck.

“Poor you,” Natasha chuckles, sounding genuinely sympathetic though not unamused. “This is going to sound kind of mean, but…need a hand with those?”

“Very funny,” he retorts, stuffing the mostly-bare chips into his mouth. “And just for that—”

She shrieks in an uncharacteristically high pitch when he flicks a bit of cheese stuck to his hand at her. “I give, I give. But—do you want me to see if Bruce has anything else? He’s usually good about finding things that are easy to eat one-handed.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” Bucky says, scooping up a more reasonable amount of cheese to demonstrate. “Honestly, if I got huffy at everyone around here who made jokes about my…situation, I probably wouldn’t have time for anything else.”

“Fair enough. Although, just so you know—when you started Steve told everyone not to tiptoe around the fact. He figured that would piss you off more than bad jokes or whatever.”

“Steve knows me pretty well. And anyway, like I’ve said—it’s not like it’s going to grow back. I’m always going to be the guy with one arm before I’m anything else, so I may as well be comfortable with that fact, right?”

“Stop talking like that,” she says, so sharply that Bucky actually stops chewing for a second.

“Like what?” he asks around a mouthful of chips.

“Like you’re no more than the sum of your extremities.” Natasha reaches for another handful of nachos and winces as a huge clump of cheese slips off the top one.

“I am literally missing an arm, Natalia. People tend to notice.”

She rests her clean hand on his knee and meets his eyes. The intensity of her expression is hard to look away from. “But that’s not all you are, James—that’s not even what people see when they look at you, not unless you tell them to. You’re the only one still calling yourself a—a one-armed hobo or whatever. If you stopped _thinking_ you make people uncomfortable, you’d probably be more comfortable yourself.”

Bucky is in the middle of chewing a massive clump of chips, so he has a moment to think before he responds, “And how do you know that?”

“Because you’re not that different than you were before, you know. You like to get along with people, you don’t like to be a burden, and you never seem to think you deserve to be kind to yourself.”

“Natalia—” He’s never known her to be so openly emotive before, and that alone gives him pause.

“You’re no more unbalanced than anyone else here, you know—which, I admit, only says so much with these guys, but…you’re a good man, James. Try to believe that now and again.”

“Um, thanks? For—for seeing that, I guess.”

“I mean it,” Natasha says.

Bucky’s suddenly very aware that her hand is still on his knee, and the realization makes him jerk back on reflex. She breaks the eye contact just as abruptly and reaches for more chips. There’s a moment of awkward silence, interrupted only by chewing.

Finally, Bucky says, “Um, thank you, then. Not many people understand…all that.”

She smiles at him, he smiles back, and about thirty seconds later, Sam arrives for his break and finds them flicking cheese at each other like a couple of six-year-olds.


	3. Chapter 3

“Steve, every time we go to that bar on Brookline Avenue, that same waitress gives you extra curly fries and her number. When are you going to call her?”

They’re playing catch with a red Frisbee on the Boston Common in the late summer sunshine, ostensibly so Bucky can work on his one-armed reflexes, but mostly because they don’t need to be at the bar for another hour, and Steve is just weeks away from graduation, so his work has finally let up.

“When you ask Natasha to dinner.”

The disc flies straight past Bucky’s head, and he doesn’t even try to reach for it. “What?”

“Buck, even _I_ can see the unresolved tension there. Come on.”

“Steve, we just work together. That’s it.”

“Every single other person you work with has put good money on _that_ not being true.” Steve jogs a few feet past him to pick up the Frisbee.

“Wait, what?”

“Seriously, there’s a betting pool. Don’t tell anyone I told you, though, or I’ll be disqualified. And I’d really like to beat Clint, although his wager’s on, uh, quote, ‘Nat jumping his bones in dry storage.’”

“Tasteful. And not wholly sanitary.”

“Look, I know you like her. You were crazy about her when you guys were together back in ’07, and I never understood why you didn’t call her after that.”

Bucky rubs his right temple and deeply wishes he had a way to rub the left one at the same time. “It was two months. We barely knew each other. I was about to deploy halfway around the world, and it didn’t seem fair to ask her to wait. Especially—well, you know how bad I was about keeping in touch abroad, even on my first tour.”

“And now?”

“Now, we…we’re friends. I think. And I guess, I’d still—but she’s so busy with grad school, and I’m just a walking, talking hot mess…”

“Bucky.” Steve places a hand on his shoulder. “I hate to be the one to break it to you, but you’re really not.”

“What?”

“You have a good job with decent wages. You pay rent. You’re doing all kinds of community engagement stuff at the VA. You’re reading books _for fun_. You no longer look like a hobo, or twitch much. You’re a functional adult, and at some point you should really look in the mirror and congratulate yourself on getting that far, because plenty of people with _way_ smaller hurdles never manage that. I mean, heck, the jury’s still out on Tony Stark, right?”

“Steve…”

“Look, just ask her out. Or don’t ask her out—I didn’t put _that_ much money into the pool. But stop using your amputation and a bad haircut as excuses for, well, anything, actually. Because you are so much stronger than that. You’re so far past that, and you can’t even see it, Bucky.”

Steve is freer with praise than Natasha, but Bucky’s pretty sure he’s never heard his friend talk like this before. “How long have you been planning on saying all of this to me?”

“A couple of weeks,” he admits, glancing down at his feet. “I needed an opening. It’s just—look, I’m going to be graduating soon. I’ve got this job with the city pending, and I want to make sure you’re going to be okay.”

“Are you kicking me out?”

“What? No! Of course not.”

“Then you know I’ll be okay. Steve, I managed on my own for a lot of years without you. We’re better together, obviously, but…”

“You lost an arm last time I wasn’t around to watch your back,” Steve said quietly. “I’m your next of kin. I should’ve—I don’t know. I know that’s not anyone’s fault, but I worry about you anyway. I don’t want you to think that you can’t do something, or that you shouldn’t be able to get what you want. If I’m not there to nudge you forward, are you just going to sink into a new rut? Because you don’t think you can have anything better—that you deserve anything better? Because you _do_ , Bucky, and—”

“Hey, Steve,” Bucky interrupts. “Shut up for a second.” He does not, he decides, hug his best friend nearly enough, so he remedies that now. “I’ll be fine, really. You will literally see me every day, and there are at least half a dozen people who’ll come hunt you down if you don’t come back to the bar once in a while. I get it—the Tower isn’t the end of the line. It’s just a stopover, and when I figure out the next thing, I’ll get my ass in gear and go do that next thing, and you can be there to harangue me all you want. Cross my heart.”

“Good,” Steve says, and there may be tears in his eyes. Steve really is one of a kind, but he’s kind of a sap.

“Why do you put up with me, anyway?” Bucky asks, backing up to throw the Frisbee again. “Even if I’m okay now…I’ve put you through a lot of shit since high school. And don’t say it’s all some kind of payback for beating up a couple of kids on the playground and letting you crash on my folks’ couch after yours died.”

“It’s not about payback, Buck. You’re my friend—that’s what we _do_. We take care of each other. Maybe you’ve needed me more the last few years, but that’s okay. You’re stuck with me, punk—and a bunch of other people, actually—so get used to it. And maybe do the dishes occasionally.”

Bucky wipes at the corner of his eye, which is suddenly a little wet, too. “Hey, I run a _mean_ dishwasher cycle.”

***

Bucky carries a half-full box of unused plastic cups from behind the bar back to the storage room at the end of a long Saturday night, only to find Natasha already in there, reaching to replace a massive sleeve of napkins on a high shelf. “Need a hand? Uh, literally?”

“Sure, thanks.” She takes his box and hands him the napkins, and he’s just rolling back onto his heels from standing on tiptoes when the door to the room slams shut.

“Shit, I must not have kicked the stopper thing under it all the way—sorry,” Bucky groans, walking back to the door and testing the handle. “Apparently it’s locked.”

“That’s so stupid drunk people can’t try to take home really strange trophies out of our dry inventory,” Natasha sighs. “Well, someone will come back here in a sec, I’m sure.”

“Uh, actually…I think this was the last of it for the night. Almost everyone’s left already; I was just helping out to kill time until Steve was done with his stuff.”

“ _Chyort voz'mi_ ,” she mutters, and then starts banging on the door. “Steve! Tony! Somebody let us out!”

After a pause, Bucky presses his ear against the door. Silence. “Okay, I know this thing isn’t that thick…”

“James,” Natasha says, very slowly like the realization is dawning on her mid-syllable. “James, you live with Steve.”

“So?”

“So, he sent you back here. And he wouldn’t leave without you, unless…”

“…He already knows where I am. _Vot der’mo_ , they set us up. Steve! Open the goddamn door, I only have one hand to bang with!”

“They?” Natasha asks, sounding more than a little suspicious. “Who is they and what are they setting us up for?”

He slumps against the door and slides down to the floor. “Apparently, there’s an ongoing pool for when you and I are going to…hook up, I guess. Hey, don’t look at me like that, I only found out this was a thing this afternoon! But apparently your friend Clint’s money is on something that involves the dry storage closet, so…”

“I will _kill_ him,” she hisses, and her fist clenches so hard that the flap of the box that she’s still holding actually rips. “After a fucking _Saturday_ shift? On a game night?”

Something flies under the door into the closet, which makes Bucky jump, but all he finds is a folded sheet of paper. “What the…”

Natasha plops down opposite Bucky and snatches it. “That’s Pepper’s handwriting—is she in on this, too?”

“I’m pretty sure that at this point everyone we work with is a culprit,” he says, grabbing it back and reading aloud. “‘Dearest comrades’—oh, good, I think she took Tony’s dictation—‘Dearest comrades, we’ve decided that you two aren’t going to have an actual conversation about 2007 _or_ 2014 unless we make you. So here we are, making you. Please try not to break anything, especially if Clint’s right and you feel the need to bone on the floor or something. Sincerely, Boston’s mightiest heroes. P.S. You’re welcome.’”

“There’s no way Pepper wrote that, let me see—” Natasha takes the note back. “Huh. Seriously?”

“I mean, it’s not like there’s much to talk about,” Bucky admits.

“No? I thought we had some good times back then.”

“Oh, no—we did. Definitely did. But I seem to recall the phrase ‘expiration date’ getting thrown around pretty liberally. So…it’s not like there’s any loose ends to tie up or whatever, right?”

“That’s…true. Kinda wish that hadn’t been the case, though.”

“Yeah, me too.” He rubs the back of his neck. “I’m sorry, I should’ve tried to call you while I was deployed. It’s just—we’d only just met, and I knew you were moving on to other things, and I didn’t want to…but it would’ve been nice to hear your voice, even far away.”

“Yours, too. Especially if I’d known what was going to happen—”

“Hey, no pulling the cripple card, that’s my line.”

“Still, I—I know you’ve been through a lot since that winter.”

Bucky can feel his pulse quickening, but for once the mounting adrenaline keeps him very still instead of giving him the jitters. “Well, yeah, but I’m—we’re here now. Functioning adults and everything. And we’re locked in a closet because apparently even the sainted Steve Rogers thinks we have some leftover sexual tension to, uh…resolve. Now. Present day.” He straightens up to inch closer to her, but she closes the distance between them before he can, and just like that, her face is inches away from his.

“He’s not wrong, I think.” She still smells the same—something vaguely floral that makes him twitch in a very good way.

“I’ve found it’s usually in my best interest to listen to him.”

“Why’s it taken you getting locked in a storage closet to say something?”

“I could ask you the same question.”

“I asked you first.”

“You said yourself you’re too busy to be anything but single,” he admits, slumping back. “And me…I keep thinking I’m too much of a mess for most human interactions, but maybe I’ve just been making dumb excuses. Maybe. Why didn’t _you_ say anything, if you…?”

“I figured—I mean, look, you’ve really been through the wringer since I saw you last, James. I’ve seen other guys come back with everything intact and still be pretty messed up, and I didn’t…I didn’t want to give you one more thing to worry about.”

“You were the one telling me I wasn’t some horrible burden on everyone the other day.”

“You’re not. But you don’t need anybody putting any extra ones on you.”

“Natalia…on what planet would you be a burden to me?”

She leans back, resting her weight on her hands and looking guarded. “You tell me.”

“When I got back—when I started working here, I needed friends. That’s what Steve figured out, that’s why he brought me here. I needed people who care if I show up to work, or get a haircut, or don’t drink while I’m on prescription drugs. That’s not a burden, that’s—that’s having support, you know?”

“And that’s all you needed? Need?”

“Natalia—well, yeah, maybe when I started. I _did_ need some time to level out, but do you know how long I’ve been kicking myself for losing you last time? I mean, I know it wouldn’t be the same now, but I’d still—and I just couldn’t really tell if you…”

“You _idiot_ ,” she whispers, almost too faintly for Bucky to hear. “We could have been doing this weeks ago.”

Before either of them can make any more stupid assumptions, he surges forward and kisses her.

***

“Holy cow, I can’t believe that actually worked,” Steve says.

Bucky blinks sleepily, reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose to help with the kind of headache that comes from not having slept enough. Not that he lacks a good excuse _._ “What are you…?”

He’s yanked into a more wakeful state by Natasha’s yelp of surprise but recovers quickly enough to at least jerk his torso in between her and Steve, who is leaning against the doorframe with a ring of keys in one hand. The other hand is politely shielding his eyes. “Take your time, guys; it’s Sunday. And, thankfully, the Tower & Shield does not do brunch.”

“What the _actual hell_ were you people thinking?” Natasha demands, voice especially husky. Bucky had forgotten how much he liked that in the morning. “You locked us in a _fucking closet_. All night!”

Steve’s hand still covers his eyes but does nothing to hide the huge grin on the lower half of his face. “It was Clint and Tony’s idea. And you’re welcome, by the way—I only agreed to go along with it if I got to be the one to let you out. Otherwise, you’d be stuck with one of them. Or both.”

Natasha groans, “I will kill _all_ of you. Painfully. James, what did you do with my shirt?”

“Uh, I think it’s tangled, here,” he tosses her a ball of fabric that’s not about to get unwound with one hand. “Steve, is _this_ why you gave me that pep talk before?”

“Possibly. I’m just glad it actually worked—do you know how long I’ve been rearranging the break schedule for you two? Betty thinks I’m nuts.”

“That was on purpose? I’m impressed. I didn’t think you had that level of sneakiness in you.” Bucky stands up to wiggle back into his pants, and Natasha chucks his now-untangled shirt onto his good shoulder.

“You can look now, Steve. No one’s naked,” Natasha says. “Also, define ‘worked,’ because I can’t imagine anyone’s goal was…this. Except Clint’s.”

Bucky cuts in, speaking in Russian and managing to grab her hand as she reties her sneakers. “Natalia, do you think I could buy you dinner one night this week? Something Bruce didn’t make? I know you’re busy, but…”

“I’ll make time,” she smiles, her voice still raspy, which makes the Russian sound even better to his ears.

Though Steve doesn’t speak a word of the language beyond _spasibo_ , he grins at their tone. “ _That_ was the goal.”

***

“Okay,” Tony says, hefting a finger of scotch and throwing his arm around Steve. “You all know how much I hate giving speeches—”

“ _Bullshit_ ,” Rhodey coughs into his hand.

“—But I just want to raise a toast to Mr. Steve Rogers, captain of the floor and of our hearts, and now officially a Master of the Arts in graphic design!”

Bucky leads a round of cheering and clapping, while Steve ducks his head bashfully and turns pink.

“So, as you all know, two years ago, this kid shows up at my door, all but demanding a job and swearing he’ll be the best floor manager in human history. Which of course turned out to be true. Steve’s the reason we survived that crazy Norwegian birthday event with the brawling brothers and their one-eyed patriarch. He got us through last winter’s ridiculous snow and this winter’s…never-ending-ness. Not to mention a World Series, a Stanley Cup final, that one guy who was bleeding from the head and wouldn’t leave—what were we calling him?”

“The Red Skull,” Sam supplied.

“Right, yeah. Point is, this place probably would’ve burned down at least twice without Steve. _And_ we finally got him to play dirty to get our favorite Soviet tag-team together.” Tony artfully dodges the napkin that Natasha throws at him from where she’s curled up against Bucky’s side. “So, let’s all raise a glass…Congratulations, man.”

As the applause dies down, Steve slides into the booth across from Bucky and Natasha, still blushing to his ears. “I’m so glad that apparently you guys are going to be my legacy. Honestly, I had to wrestle that Norwegian bodybuilder guy to the ground, but all people here are going to remember is that I willingly locked my best friend in a closet overnight,” he groans.

“Eh,” Bucky says, taking a sip of his first beer in nearly two years, “It worked out okay.”

“And any of us could have wrestled the Odinson brothers apart; you just got there first,” Natasha adds, mock-consolingly.

“So, that’s how this is going to work?” Steve asks, gesturing between them. “You two just ganging up on everyone else?”

Bucky pretends to consider this. “Seems fair. You all _did_ lock us in a closet overnight.”

“That was one time!” Steve mutters. “Oh, and by the way—I think you might’ve missed this in the mail yesterday.”

He hands Bucky an unopened letter, and Natasha’s clearly about to make a joke about the dry storage incident until she notices the Army insignia on it. “What is it? They can’t be recalling you…”

“Just open it,” Bruce says from behind the booth.

Bucky twists around to give the cook the funny look he deserves and then thumbs open the envelope. Natasha leans over to read it with him.

“Oh my god,” he chokes out after a minute. “I’m getting an arm. Like, the really good kind, with…oh my god.”

Everyone standing within earshot gasps in near-unison, and Bucky turns to look at a very pleased Steve and then back at Bruce. “You knew about this?”

“Friend of mine from MIT works in engineering,” Bruce shrugs. “You wouldn’t believe how much work they do with the government. Steve and I asked a couple of questions, she made a couple of calls…I didn’t want to say anything until there was something to tell.”

“Thank you,” Bucky breathes, staring at the text. “I can’t even—thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Bruce says faintly, turning his attention to an approaching Betty.

“Sorry for the secrecy,” Steve says, not sounding apologetic at all. “And I know how you feel about some of the prosthetics you’ve tried, but I figured you’d go for one of the fancier models, if you could, especially with Natasha in the picture.”

“Oh, I’m good. He manages better with the one hand than most men can do with two,” Natasha says. “If you know what I mean.”

Bucky laughs. “Thanks for the endorsement.”

“Anytime, _lyubimyi_ ,” she murmurs, kissing his cheek. “By the way,” she adds, running her hand up the exposed back of his neck, “I like the new haircut.”

**Author's Note:**

> Though this story is not meant as an in-depth exploration of recovering from limb amputation, Bucky's decision to operate without a prosthetic is [not uncommon among upper-body amputees](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/27/us/prosthetic-arms-a-complex-test-for-amputees.html), and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology does indeed do a lot of work with [bionic limbs](http://biomech.media.mit.edu/#/about/). 
> 
> The Tower & Shield is meant to be located where the [original Cheers pub](http://www.cheersboston.com/main_locations_beaconhill.html) is, in downtown Boston. The rest of the places mentioned—including [the Boston Common](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Common) and [the Cask 'n Flagon](http://www.casknflagon.com/), where Amber is the waitress who keeps hitting on Steve—are real, just like Clint's [Southie accent](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_accent).
> 
> "[Boston Strong](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Strong)" is a slogan that became popular in response to the Boston Marathon bombings in April 2013.
> 
> The title is, of course, from the [Cheers opening theme](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rS0VQOHX7lM).
> 
> (Disclaimer: I don't speak Russian, but Bucky and Natasha both like swearing in it, so those phrases are the best translations and transliterations Google could furnish me with.)


End file.
